Running Web Player or Automation Services on Linux

If you install a node manager on a Linux host with the intention to use it for a Spotfire Web Player or Automation Services service, there are a few additional things required. You should also be aware of some differences that your end users might encounter when opening analyses on clients running on different operating systems (for example, if the authors of the analyses use Spotfire Analyst (on Windows), and the consumer users run a web client from a Web Player service on Linux).

Before you begin

You have reviewed the system requirements to make sure you use a supported Linux distribution.
You have installed and trusted a node manager on your Linux host. For instructions, see Installing a node manager (RPM Linux) or Installing a node manager (tarball Linux) and Trusting a node.
You have added a Spotfire Web Player instance or an Automation Services instance to the node.
Note: The prerequisite script for your Linux distribution, described in steps 2 and 3, is not available until you install one of these services. When you install one of these services, the service auto-starts, and then it displays an error that the script has not yet been run. You can disregard this error at this point.
You have deployed Spotfire.Dxp.netcore-linux.sdn to a deployment area on Spotfire Server. For instructions, see Deploying client packages to Spotfire Server.

About this task

Before you deploy the client packages, follow the steps below to install required packages and fonts on the Linux node manager host.

Procedure

Make sure that the required .NET version is installed on your node manager host.
For example, see Install .NET on Debian, Install .NET on Ubuntu, or other resources.
Locate the Tools directory in the deployed files on the target host, and find the prerequisites script for your Linux distribution.
For example, if you want to use Debian: {node-manager-installation-directory}/ spotfirenodemanager-{version-number}.x86_64/nm/services/webworker-net-core-*/Tools/prerequisites-debian11.sh.
Run the script corresponding to your distribution, for example:
```
sh prerequisites-debian11.sh
```
This will install required system dependencies and recommended font packages on the host.
Restart the service.
Optional: To use the Dremio or Apache Drill connectors, you must create a driver entry on the Linux host with the expected Windows name. See Connector for Dremio and Connector for Apache Drill in the Drivers and data sources in Spotfire document for more information.
Optional: To use the Oracle or Teradata connectors, you must package the DLL files from nuget packages and create an SPK file to deploy separately on the deployment area. See the information about Oracle and Teradata, respectively, in the Drivers and data sources in Spotfire document, for details about the required DLLs. See also the Developer Documentation for information about how to build packages.

Results

Once the steps have been completed, it is possible for end users to create and open analyses running on the Linux node.

Review the notes below for additional information.

Note: There are some differences when using Web Player or Automation Services on Linux, compared to Windows.

Formatting of numbers and dates can have minor differences (for example, rounding to a specific number of decimals is handled slightly differently on Linux and Windows).
Available fonts may differ when running on Linux and Windows. Suitable fonts must be installed on the Web Player host to be able to show the same fonts in a Linux environment as those you have when creating analyses with Spotfire Analyst. By running the script in the steps below, you get some common fonts on both systems, but, to be able to use, for example, a specific company font, you must install that font separately on the Linux host. Rendering of fonts might still be different on the different systems. An administrator can specify preferred fonts as a preference, to help authors choose appropriate fonts.
Analyses with linked data to files are generally not supported on Linux due to differences in file paths and case-sensitivity on Linux and Windows.
Custom extensions must be compiled for the target framework, which differs in Linux and Windows. This means that extensions developed for services on Windows will not work when running the service on Linux, unless they are recompiled for the Linux target framework (due to differences in the .NET requirements). If using both operating systems, custom extensions must be compiled for both target frameworks. See Building packages that work with the Web Player on Linux in the Developer Documentation for more information.
The information available from certificates when running on Windows and Linux is slightly different.

Note: The following capabilities are not supported on Linux.

Kerberos is not supported on Linux.
Some data connectors are not supported on Linux: Vertica, SAP, Oracle Essbase & Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS)
The two Automation Services tasks "Set Data Source Credentials" and "Set Credentials for External Connection" are not supported on Linux.
Windows Metafiles (WMF & EMF) are not supported in visualizations when running on Linux.
The legacy "Export to PDF" functionality is not available on Linux, including when used via Automation Services.
The scheduled updates cache is not available when running a Web Player service on Linux. This means that if a Linux node running scheduled updates is restarted, scheduled updates will need to load the data from the sources again, rather than reading data from the cache on disk.
Data functions using Spotfire® Statistics Services are not supported in Web Player or Automation Services on Linux.